


In Fine Temporum

by unknownsister



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Bisexual Irene Adler, Bisexual John Watson, Bisexuality, Cultural Differences, Dubious Science, F/M, Fish out of Water, Friends With Benefits, Irene and John are the friends with benefits, M/M, Sex Shop, Sex Toys, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-20
Updated: 2015-08-14
Packaged: 2018-01-13 04:07:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1212094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknownsister/pseuds/unknownsister
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock Holmes, Duke of Sussex, (b.1863) was never supposed to meet John Watson (b. 1978). John's ex finds a wormhole that pulls Sherlock to the future with plenty of modern problems for a man of the past. Age differences are the least of their worries.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> 08/14/15 - This is a new work in progress! I let it fall by the wayside while working on other projects, but there are a few chapters written + a lovely commission from deebzy! Check out the cover art for the fic below. This chapter has been written & updated, so it'll sound familiar, but some changes have been made. 
> 
> This work is slow, but not abandoned & hopefully updated with more soon. A thousand thanks to my wonderful beta, [Chelsea](http://archiveofourown.org/users/chemma66/pseuds/intricatearticulation). Check out what's going on more frequently at [my tumblr](http://unknownsister.tumblr.com). Thanks!  
> \--------------
> 
> This was written for [swimmingbirdrunningrock](http://swimmingbirdrunningrock.tumblr.com/) for the [Johnlock Challenge's Valentine's Exchange](http://johnlockchallenges.tumblr.com/post/73920168494/johnlock-valentines-day-exchange-were-back-and). Their prompt was simply 'Johnlock', so I've run away with that a bit.
> 
> I'm more than a few days late, for which I apologize to my giftee [sorry!]. This here is a fusion with the 2001 rom-com Kate & Leopold, a terrible contribution to the history of cinema & one my absolute favorite guilty pleasures. Thanks to the effervescent [Chelsea](http://intricatearticulation.tumblr.com/) for her idea for the fic & her beta support!

                                                                             

[credit to deebzy!](http://deebzy.tumblr.com/post/125555816419/commission-for-unknownsister-this-is-a-poster-for) Thank you! 

oOo

London rain sweeps in lazy curtains across the pavement. A crowd huddles together under the weather, not enough to cancel the events, but enough to make everyone miserable. Sherlock Holmes, Duke of Sussex, would have been miserable anyway, rain or shine. 

His brother, Mycroft Holmes, Duke of Somewhere Boring, stands before the onlookers on the marble steps of a new branch of the British Museum, saying something no doubt terribly important and self-serving for the British government. The British Museum of Natural History held skeletons and dust and evolution, critical elements of Sherlock's continued study of criminology. He'd like to actually go inside, but the ceremony being led by his lordship was taking ages. Sherlock was ready to sneak out of the crowd for his own grand viewing of the building, but he felt his brother's eyes on him anytime he so much as turned his head.

Mycroft held his brother under his thumb at the moment. The duke threatened disownment at every breakfast before this ceremony, making Sherlock swear to be there on pain of elaborate punishment. He'd probably make him go to a ball. Sherlock wrinkles his nose at the thought. Even now, three women in the crowd before him continue to look over their shoulders and giggle, umbrellas twirling coyly. The very nerve.

Sherlock sniffs and ignores them. Mycroft probably placed them there on purpose just to annoy him or continue his nagging about Sherlock finding a suitable spouse. Romance in all its deceiving forms hold zero interest for his enlightened mind. Romanticism was for the age before his; Sherlock preferred realism, hard science, simple truths. Despite his protests, there was to be a ball tonight anyway, at the Holmes London townhouse. A wife for the younger brother of a duke was enough to pull people from all over London society.

But his plans for escaping were already in place. He possessed the friendship of a network of street ruffians, individuals without a home, but many of them with a brain. With their help, he would flee into the heart of London and never look back. Money was tucked all over the city and continent in places he knew Mycroft would never find. He would never find Sherlock either. He could study his blood spatters and in peace. No more marriages, no more nagging, no more family honor to uphold.

A discrete clicking noise draws Sherlock from his thoughts. He doesn't turn immediately, but tries to listen over the pattering of rain on his umbrella to discern where it's coming from. A woman to his side holds a slim metal device in her hands, lifting it chest high where it emits a soft click. Despite her low cap and baggy trousers, she's clearly a woman in disguise. Her air is smug as she pulls the device back into her pocket, tugging on her cap and collar against the rain.

She begins to retreat through the crowd when they politely applaud the end of his brother's speech. Intrigued, Sherlock decides to abandon his brother's scrutiny for a moment of excitement and follows the woman towards the back of the audience. They brush past the same people, but while the woman is given dirty looks, Sherlock is fawned over, bows and umbrellas tipping out of the way for his path. Many of the crowd greet him, asking after his health and his big announcement at the ball this evening.

Annoyed, he continues to bull through them, realizing that the woman surely heard the commotion behind her. He proves the thought as she looks over her shoulder and calculates him on the spot. Her eyes light up with hidden knowledge and it stuns Sherlock to see a technique he so often uses on other people turned against him. She mustn't escape! 

With a final shove, he breaks free of the crowd, dropping his umbrella. Before he gets very far, two of his brother's lackeys confront him, subtly blocking his way and facing forward. He almost causes a scene, just for the reaction it would evoke from the politely shocked crowd behind him. The urge doesn't really pass, but he settles, running his fingers through his wet curls as someone hands him his discarded umbrella.

His attention barely focuses on the guided tour of the new branch, details of the strange woman and her odd contraption forefront in his mind.

oOo

Sherlock's valet finishes tying his cravat, pulling the material into elegant lines. The young noble looks sharp, his battle armor polished at every seam. He wears an embroidered dinner jacket, elaborate designs spreading the breadth of his wide shoulders, sweeping his neck and the base of his spine. A sash cinches at his hip, a swath of color across his chest to show his status. As if anyone in the ballroom downstairs didn't know who he was.

He rolls his eyes as the valet brushes off any stray spots of dust from the immaculate coat, and looks over himself in the mirror. Respectable for now, every inch the duke while it was convenient for him. The clock on the mantlepiece strikes the hour and he knows his accomplice Billy awaits his signal on the street outside. Tonight is the night he'll escape. He cannot help the scowl that appears when his brother shows up in the door behind him, and allows the fanciful thought that perhaps his brother is conjured when thought of. He turns to the valet, taking the cufflinks from him and glaring at Mycroft's reflection.

“I find I suddenly need a drink. Fetch me one.”

His valet nods and leaves the room, the tension escalating as he passes the door and Mycroft closes it behind him.

“Sherlock.”

Sherlock refuses to answer, ducking his head to let his curls fall forward on his brow, fiddling with his cufflinks. He wears his hair unfashionably long on purpose for how much it annoys Mycroft. He knows his brother would give anything to tie him to the barber's chair for ten minutes.

Mycroft sighs and comes to stand next to Sherlock's desk, covered in notes, literature and a morbid skull. He runs one finger over the curved dome before speaking. 

“You know that if there was any other way, I would offer the alternative to you.”

Sherlock scoffs and turns away, heading to his cabinet to look busy with its contents.

“I didn't escape marriage either, brother.” 

His temper flares at the obvious attempt at camaraderie.

“Oh yes, Mycroft. You tried so very hard to escape.”

“Our family's legacy relies on heirs. Our house will not fall.”

Mycroft leafs through a few pages on Sherlock's desk, disorganizing them just by looking at them.

“Don't touch those.”

Mycroft continues his perusal, speaking in that soft, irritating way of his. 

“You can still have your progress and invention, Sherlock. But what I speak of downstairs is reality. You must marry.”

Sherlock turns to his brother, looking down his nose in his best impression of nobility.

“Marriage? Marriage is the promise of eternal love. As a man of honor, I cannot promise eternally what I have not felt momentarily.”

“Don't be ridiculous.”

“Am I being ridiculous? Don't tell me that you actually love your spouse.”

“Anthea is a model wife.”

“Exactly – a model wife for your model home with your model future. I'm not a doll to be placed as you will, Mycroft. You keep me here under promise of disowning me, but what do I care for titles and lordships when the real people out there on the streets are far more interesting than a peerage.”

“Sherlock –”

The valet re-enters the room with a finger of whiskey. Sherlock takes it from him and downs it all in one fiery swallow. It settles low in his belly and he faces the door, sliding on his trademark black gloves. They match his outfit and his mood.

“Come, brother. Don't we have a soirée to attend? I've heard I have a big announcement to make.”

He leaves Mycroft standing at his desk, mouth tight with displeasure, and descends to the chattering crowd below.

oOo

Sherlock passes off the woman in his arms to another waiting gentleman. He decided on four waltzes as the maximum number he could withstand and after this third one, he's not sure if it was wise to make it so many. The perfume from this last partner escalated his pounding headache and he shuts out the noise of the party to leave the floor, declining dance cards all the way to the wall.

He idly watches the swirl of long bustles and polished shoes while holding a glass of wine. His mind travels through the glass panes, to his boy waiting on the street, the carriage beyond him, his luggage already dispatched. Freedom was very close.

He looks to the entry of the hall, trying to estimate if his brother would force him to speak before his plan was set into action. Instead of his brother in the door, a woman in a plain, if elegant dress stands there instead, subtly searching the faces in the crowd. She styled her hair appropriately, but it falls the wrong way, done by someone in haste. When she moves the long skirt of her dress, Sherlock immediately notices the state of her shoes and finds himself bewildered. They look to be some kind of flat shoe with thick soles, laces crossing over the top, keeping a flat tongue of cloth secure. He studies her face again and recognizes her. This is the woman!

He cannot see any purse, but she lifts the silver device again, small as a finger. While he's too far away to hear the little whir, he imagines it and starts towards the her, determined to find out what the slim box does and how she got into the party.

She sees him before he can get much closer and turns to leave the entryway, ascending the stairs while he skirts the walls.

He quietly treads the stairs, giving her time to feel he's forgotten about her. The turn of paper coming from his study catches his ear and he watches from the doorway as she uses her mystery device again on the pages of his research.

She marks his entrance, yet she continues to read over his work with an eagerness that surprises him. As he watches, she begins to shuffle in her clothes and yanking at the elbow length gloves. 

“I don't understand how women did this back then. Back … now."

She faces away from him, presenting the line of her laces.

“If you please.”

Sherlock remains in the doorway, unbalanced.

She gestures at her back with a wave of her fingers over her shoulder.

“Undo these damnable things.”

He steps forward and begins to unlace the tight knots of her gown. The laces are done haphazardly in the first place and he has to pick them apart in several spots. As the material splits, she heaves in a great breath and puts her hands on her hips, stretching from side to side. She reaches behind herself and does up the bottom three laces much looser than before.

“That's better.”

She turns to face him, her hair falling out of the hasty braids. He wants to see her shoes again.

“Who are you?”

She smiles and Sherlock frowns to find himself charmed by it. It's knowing and just a bit mischievous.

“I'm Irene Adler.”

“What is that clicking device you're carrying? Is it a recorder?”

Her smile grows more genuine. She draws a finger down the side of his face and he fights the urge to show weakness and withdraw.

“You're as clever as the history books said.”

She taps a nailed finger on his mouth and it opens in surprise, but before he can speak, she's at the window, sitting on the inside ledge to watch him with a bemused smile, the pull of her mouth softer. 

As soon as Sherlock steps closer, she hikes open the window and looks down to the garden below, holding her palm out to catch the rain. A piece of paper is clutched in her hand, one of Sherlock's designs from his desk. 

“I've got quite a problem with impulse control. I couldn't resist getting a look at you. You are a bit of a childhood obsession of mine.”

She tucks her feet up and over the outside ledge and leans her head back as Sherlock sprints across the room to grab her.

“Laterz, your grace.”

She drops out of sight before Sherlock can reach her. He sticks his head out the window and watches in shocked admiration as she tucks her body and rolls when she hits the ground, coming back up to take off in a sprint. 

Sherlock doesn't even change clothes, though he grabs his long coat, as he rushes down the stairs and after Irene Adler, waving Billy off, his heart pounding with the chase.

oOo

She has a cab this time and Sherlock has enough time to snatch a horse from the street and is soon galloping over the cobblestones in pursuit. He races through alleys and crowded streets, forcing bystanders aside in fierce pursuit. Her cab rattles in front of him, just that little bit faster as his horse is blocked at every other turn.

Parliament looms before them, then beside them as they crash onto Westminster Bridge. Sherlock pulls his steed to a sharp halt as Irene throws herself out of the carriage and towards the ledge of the bridge. He wipes the rain from his eyes with an irritated swipe and dismounts, flinging himself forwards just as she tips over the side, ignoring the yell of her cabbie.

He snatches the edge of her long skirt in his fingers, pulled to the precipice with the rushing black water below. Big Ben starts tolling as his feet slip. He teeters as she yells at him. 

“Let me go! It's fine! I'm fine!”

He has a moment to consider releasing her, but her thrashing makes the decision for him and he's tipping forward to follow her over the edge. He's suddenly flying, Irene's skirts billowing around them and surely they're falling for much too long? 

Just before he loses consciousness, he can hear Irene screaming.

“Idiot! You're such an idiot!”

The world goes dark.

  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Irene Adler turned seven this year.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please check out chapter one as it has been revamped! It also has some **amazing** cover art now, whoo! Onto the Irene set up - I'm trying to give her a foundation for the wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff, so bear with me :)
> 
> Many thanks for the cheerleading from my lovely beta, [Chelsea](http://archiveofourown.org/users/chemma66/pseuds/intricatearticulation). She's my editor in shining armor. Any leftover mistakes are my own.

~1995~

Irene Adler turned seven this year. For her birthday, her parents gifted her a frilly pink dress, white gloves and Mary Janes. Layers of crinoline and taffeta surround her when she wears it and she feels like a delicately frosted cupcake. It's her favorite possession and she wears it on special occasions.

Today is a day for the dress. Her great grandmother – Grandmaman – is turning ninety-six and her spectacular party chatters incessantly, background noise as Irene escapes the ballroom. She walks with purpose, polished shoes tapping the hardwood floors. She runs her gloves over side tables, family portraits in sturdy frames staring down their ancient noses at her progress.

She halts in the foyer and stares up, up, up at her favorite portrait. It faces the parlor where a gathering of guests talk quietly over their whiskey glasses, a harbor from the festivities. Irene ignores them and tilts her head for a better view.

It is a real oil paining, her Grandmaman had told her. The two brothers who were the subjects would have had to sit very still for a very long time for the artist to capture their likeness. Irene thinks of this every time she studies the portrait; while one brother smiles blandly, the other has the most terrific scowl. She wonders if his face hurt to hold such a frown for the amount of time it took to make the portrait. She wonders what made him so upset.

“What a pretty dress you've picked out for my party, _mon cher_.”

Her Grandmaman's perfume reaches her before her words. Irene continues to study the painting, her perfectly formed curls tipping over her shoulder as she straightens her view.

“Happy birthday, Grandmaman,” she murmurs respectfully while her attention remains focused on her ancestors.

She earns a kiss on the cheek and remains still while her Grandmaman's handkerchief wipes away the smudges of lipstick her affection left behind. Her perfume is stronger now, something flowery that Irene associates only with her Grandmaman and her mirrored vanity. Her hairspray overlays it, sickly sweet and a tad overdone. She must be due for a hair appointment if she's trying to wrangle her hair, Irene thinks idly, the details that wash over her in every moment absorbed, cataloged and sorted by usefulness in the blink of an eye.

Her Grandmaman links their elbows; they are nearly the same height. Irene longs to grow taller, but her Grandmaman is still graceful in her twilight, even stooped with age.

“You're obsessed with this painting,” she tuts and pats Irene's wrist while shaking her head. Her tone is more fond than exasperated, but Irene supposes she has every right to be fed up. Every time she visits, she asks about the siblings.

She jostles her Grandmaman's arm, pointing towards them. “Tell me about him again.”

With a sigh, her Grandmaman points at the seated man, her hands barely shaking.

“Here is my father, Mycroft,” she says with reserved affection. “He could be cold sometimes, but he loved us children. I think when his brother went missing, it changed him.”  
She points to the other man as she speaks. “And this is Uncle Sherlock. I never met him, I'm afraid. All I know of him is second-hand.”

“He was odd, wasn't he?” Irene prompts, urging the storyteller side of her Grandmaman to surface.

“Odd! Perhaps, darling. I think he was trapped. Out of time.”

Irene wrinkles her nose at the unusual turn of phrase. “What do you mean 'out of time'?”

Grandmaman leads them to a stiff chair in the foyer, meant for decoration. “He was not meant for his time,” she groans as she seats herself, her hands fluttering in explanation. “There were so many constraints back then. He lived only for his books and experiments, but that was not what was expected of him.”

Irene rests her gloved hand on the chair, staring up at her ancestors. Her own room is packed with many books, fantasy and travel and wildlife. Every time she finishes one, Irene wants to know more. Her father had called her 'insatiable,' while her mother told her she couldn't take all of them to boarding school. She wonders how many books Sherlock had, what kind.

Grandmaman continues, interrupting Irene's daydreaming. “He was a pioneer of criminology. They didn't call it that back then, but he was interested in crimes and invented all sorts of unusual things to help the police.” The look on her face is distant, as if she were a million miles away. “Father rarely spoke of him, but I believe he blamed the French side of the family for his eccentricity.”

Irene frowns but her Grandmaman's eyes twinkle with mischief as she leans over to whisper to her. “He often said the same thing about me.” The giggle escapes Irene without her permission and she covers her mouth, glancing at the guests to see if they heard. When Grandmaman told her stories, she felt like they were just for them and she didn't want any interruptions.

Barely covering her indulgent smile, her Grandmaman straightens again, returning her attention to the portrait.

“My grandmother – their mother – was French. My mother was as well and she told me that my grandmother's side came from a long line of adventuresome pirates and that was where the wildness came from.” She looks down at Irene, thoughtful. “Perhaps that is why he was so restless.”

“He was a black sheep,” Irene pipes up. Grandmaman had told her the phrase last time she asked about the portrait and the phrase stuck with her. It described Sherlock physically as well as Irene. Their features were sharp – feline – and their hair was dark, while much of their family had red or fair hair.

It was one more thing to put her closer to him, this relation she couldn't explain. “What happened next?” she asks, even though she doesn't like this part.

“It was the night of his engagement. My father put on a splendid party, but when he went to fetch Sherlock, he had disappeared without a trace. They tore London apart trying to find him, but it's as if vanished into thin air.”

“But how can someone just _vanish_?” Irene tuts, unsatisfied with the ending of this story every time. “Someone must have seen something.”  
The chair creaks as her Grandmaman rises. Irene automatically sticks out her arm to help her balance and they give a final glance to the portrait. “If they did, they never came forward. He left behind many journals and patents that led to great discoveries in criminology.” They turn and start back for the party. “Father was very fond of him,” she continues sadly. “I knew it pained him to mention him. He kept his things locked up like a vault after his brother's death.”

“No one said he died though,” says Irene, with the conviction of someone who knows they're being clever. “He could still be out there. I should like to meet him.”

Her Grandmaman chuckles and wraps her arm around Irene's elbow. “ _Mon cher_ , he's been dead a long time, I'm certain. He would be very, very old by now.”

“But _you're_ very old,” Irene continues, undeterred. “What's to say he's not very old somewhere, living a different life?” It sounds perfectly reasonable to her.

Grandmaman pats her on the cheek and smiles indulgently. “Never lose that imagination. Perhaps you will meet him someday. I was always told nothing is impossible, so I tell it to you now.” She waves a hand in front of them. “But now, we must return to my party. Especially so everyone can see your lovely dress.”

Irene preens, just a little, but she gives a final glance over her shoulder at the portrait as they leave. Sherlock watches them go, his strange grey eyes telling her something she doesn't understand.

Her parents wrap her in her coat in the foyer while their car is being readied after the party is through. Before they leave, a maid brings a brown paper wrapped parcel to Irene, with a note from her Grandmaman.

_You are old enough for these now, my black sheep. Take good care of them and keep surprising me._

She unwraps the package impatiently in the backseat of the car. London's streetlights flash by and light up the gold name inscribed on three black leather journals: _Sherlock Holmes._

~1999~

Eleven years old is much the same as ten, Irene thinks. Grown-ups still don't listen to her, call her 'precocious', and expect her to not to speak up so much. Summer months have rolled in and she's home on holiday from her boarding school.

One good thing had come out of school: a classmate introduced her to an old television program called _Doctor Who_. The tapes had hand-written labels, watched in the common room after study hours. They felt like they had fallen out of time, much like The Doctor himself. Irene was enchanted with Three (her favorite) and his physicality, his ability to charm, negotiate, and command a room. Exiled away from his home, Irene felt a kinship and looked to the stars as often as he did, dreaming of somewhere else.

The tapes went home with her classmate, but the bookshop on the corner carried worn-out paperback serializations. The Daleks might have faded with time on the covers, but The Doctor looked as sharp as ever. Irene carried home four books one afternoon and stayed up until she finished them all.

They now rest next to her most prized possessions – Sherlock's journals.

She lies on her floor, bored and staring at her bookcase. Destiny's Child comes on the radio and she kicks her feet in time, letting her mind wander. The lurid 70's spines of the novels catch her eye and contrast sharply with the simple black of the journals next to them. They suit each other, she thinks.

In-between his scribbles for inventions and rantings about the idiocy of society, Sherlock drew lots of squiggly equations with math too complicated for Irene to parse. Yet.

She knew from the accompanying writings that he was interested in accelerated time frames and how they could be applied to his experiments. One way the two of them differed was patience; Irene would wait for something she wanted, steady with a calm beyond her years until she obtained her prize. To read Sherlock, one would think there was never enough time in the world. His irritation with the slow pace of everything around him bled through in paragraph after paragraph.

After devouring Sherlock's writings over and over, Irene feels like she knows her distant relative more than anyone else, even his brother. His words stamp themselves in minute detail on her memory and with the introduction of The Doctor into her life, she begins to wonder about his time theories as well, even as she struggles to understand what any of it means.

What she _does_ understand is the frustration, the press of pen to paper to release some of the anger he felt at his situation, the joy he experienced with new discoveries, his lifeblood bound in his work. The journals often read like exciting novels to Irene, filled with words she has to look up and accounts of Sherlock putting himself in great danger to test his methods. She has a feeling there are more journals elsewhere, but she cannot be certain. The ones she owns are from when Sherlock was slightly older than her, in his late teen years. Her personal journal – black, of course – lies underneath her pillow, filled with secrets she's sure Sherlock would understand.

Sherlock meeting The Doctor would be a sight, she eventually decides. They weren't very different at all. Such distinguished conversations they would have! Chemistry would be high on the list, then perhaps how murders are solved on Gallifrey. She rolls onto her stomach and frowns. Do they have murders there? Then time travel for sure. The Doctor could sort out Sherlock's wobbly lines in the margins.

Just like Irene, Sherlock would want to know how everything works. Perhaps he would want to be a companion, escape to the stars. She wrinkles her nose – he would never be the sidekick. The idea repulses her as much as imagining herself as a companion. No, they would be Time Lord and Lady, commandeering a TARDIS just like The Doctor.

She grabs her journal, flops on her front and opens it to a blank page, glittery gel pen smoothing down the paper. The shape of a green TARDIS forms and she taps her mouth with the end of her pen, contemplating.

Maybe that's what happened to Sherlock: The Doctor came to visit and stole him away. Maybe they were out there right now, rescuing planets and solving ghastly space murders. The thought makes her giggle and she buries her face in the crook of her arm.

As she continues her TARDIS, she draws a tall man with sharp cheekbones and herself, standing beside their space ship. If The Doctor and Sherlock were out there, she'd find a way to join them.

~2004~

Grandmaman passes away at age one-hundred and five. In her will, she leaves the deed to her house in Belgravia to Irene and a giant ancient trunk. Moving men bring it directly into her room and leave her in the quiet, her heartbeat the loudest noise in the room. While her family bickers downstairs about the wisdom of leaving a million pound house to a sixteen year old, Irene stares at the golden letters stamped and flecked with age under the lock of the chest: _S.H._

Her hand feels clammy around the cold iron of the key. She clenches it tighter, uncertain of what waits in the chest. Would this change things? Were there secrets about Sherlock she might discover? He had become such a stable figure in her life – someone long dead, but so near to her heart. A tiny part of her wants to shove the chest in the corner and never open it.

The overwhelming majority pushes the key into the lock and with a loud rattle of its teeth, the lock gives way and Irene pushes open the chest, dead air rising and bringing with it the smell of another time.

The arguing downstairs fades away and sunlight beams through her window to land on yellowed tissue paper, delicately wrapped packages lying on the top. She grabs the first one before she can think better of it and realizes they are clothes. A rich burgundy waistcoat with dull golden buttons, black gloves of supple deerskin, items carefully folded and tucked away. She sets them aside in a pile, digging deeper.

Broken glass equipment didn't make it through however many moves the chest went through. She mourns the loss for a moment, but sets them aside as well. Beneath them lie rolls of charts wrapped in thick paper to retain their shape. As she moves further into the trunk, her heart climbs higher and higher into her throat until she has to sit back, a long wooden case resting in her lap.

An entire life surrounds her and Irene feels immeasurably sad. For the first time, she really allows herself to think of Sherlock as being dead; of course, she knew he was dead on a practical level. But some part of her, the part that still felt like a little girl, kept a naïve ignorance about this person whom she'd never meet. She felt close to him like no other person and it pained her to think of someone packing up his room after he died and his brilliant mind locked away forever.

She sighs and opens the case on her lap. Within lies the most beautiful violin Irene's ever seen. The subdued red velvet rotted in the interior, but the instrument is enchanting, carved and shaped with love by a master. The strings would need to be replaced and the body cleaned, but Irene instantly adores it, though music hasn't interested her much before. She leans close and yes, the faintest hint of resin wafts forward. She shuts her eyes and she can almost hear the music it once played.

Shutting it again, she carefully sets it to the side to pull out the final layer of the chest. Lining the bottom is a row of familiar journals, black and comforting and all unread, ready for Irene to devour. Oh, she can barely contain her excitement, pushing halfway into the trunk to snatch them up. Just as her fingers brush the first one, a buzz in her back pocket startles her and she pulls up short.

She pulls out her Razr phone, hot pink and slim. It's a missed call from Ally Mason, a girl from school who everyone called a lezzy, so Irene asked her out, just to investigate. They'd snogged a few times, much to Irene's delight. Last night at Ally's party, in-between sticky lipgloss kisses down her neck, the girl had let Irene sneak her hand up her shirt. A thrill runs through Irene just thinking about how her fingers had pushed past satin and cupped her bare breast, warm and perfect in her palm. Ally promised even more if Irene wanted to come over again. She swallows and considers. Boys were disposable and easy for Irene to run through – ever since she hit puberty, they were a dime a dozen. But girls were something new for her and Irene's skin warms all over just thinking about all the things she has to learn. She isn't particularly fond of Ally, but the idea of her makes Irene's finger hover over the call-back button.

Looking at the stacks around her makes her hesitate even further; there's so much to learn _here_. Sherlock's journals call to her in the bottom of that huge trunk, a chance to satisfy a much deeper itch than girls. A time capsule just for her. She tucks the phone away in her back pocket and gathers up the journals like precious cargo, spreading them out on her bed and finding the first one. It picks up several years after her last one ended and just like that, the rest of the world disappears as she falls into the past. Girls are one thing, but tonight belongs to one man alone.

Girls could wait.

~2006~

Red fingernails tap, tap, tap on the armrest of the university seating. Irene checks the clock on her mobile, though she knows the time. It's a nervous gesture borne of her surroundings. For her eighteenth birthday, all she asked for was tickets to Stephen Hawking's lecture and her parents begrudgingly provided them for her. She waits now in the second row, thinking of cool water, waving grass, infinite space to calm down.

There's no need for her to be nervous, not really. She takes a deep breath. Irene looks up to the professor a great deal, that's all. He ties in closely with her 'hobbies,' as her father calls them. Someone more knowledgeable might call them research.

It was expected of Irene to marry soon, to a respectable boy of her class. University was optional, children were not. She sees her life stretching out in the ghost wake of her mother's – providing cocktails for her wealthy husband, firing nannies and developing a pill habit before she was thirty just to survive.

What her family had not accounted for was Irene being so _sharp_. She consistently makes the best marks in her class, though she carefully keeps this fact concealed. For not only is she smart, Irene knows the worth of her physicality, the need for intelligence as well as cunning. For a girl at the end of her adolescence, she already feels bored of all the children around her, gasping for a moment of her time.

Oddly, the more bored she became with her peers, the more desirable she was in their eyes. People became desperate, willing to tell her all sorts of things to get her to glance their way. The invisible currency of secrets is her hobby, a stress reliever of sorts. Theoretical physics is her obsession. Hence, her presence in the audience of her most revered theoretical physicist.

A few years ago, she would never have dreamed of herself here. She categorizes her life into the summer she was sixteen, unwrapping Sherlock's adult life one journal and chart a time, then everything that came after. It started as a distraction – Irene often found herself irredeemably bored. She spread Sherlock's charts on her wall instead of glossy pictures of boy bands and puzzled over them before she slept each night. Sleep never came easily to a mind that _would not shut up_ and she would inevitably rise and pace, staring them down as if she could intimidate them into telling her what they meant.

Some of them were easy – anatomy sketches rendered in Sherlock's careful hand. Not only humans, but animals and plants as well, scribbles of information and theories crammed into every corner of space available. A few of them were harder, mismatched scales of music crammed with math; it looked like Sherlock was trying to convert his compositions into equations, though for what purpose Irene couldn't begin to guess. He wrote about hearing math as music, certain words as colors, whimsical thoughts she was sure he would share with no one.

Then finally, there was the problem of the time charts.

As varied as Sherlock's interests were, Irene could not fully understand why time had captured the great machinations of his brain as much as it did. Reading through his journals again and again, it seemed time was essentially impossible for him to figure out and this irritated him to no end. What started as scribbles in the margins of his first journals turned to a full page or two in the later ones. This spoke of their importance when the rest of the pages were dedicated to criminology, chemistry, and discovering new techniques for photography. An impossible problem, always in the background.

It started as a way for her to feel closer to him, pulling apart this problem that wiggled like a bad tooth in the back of his mind while he worked and worked and worked. He might as well have tried to outsmart death, but in his writings, it became an issue he came back to when he needed to distract himself from cases or his looming responsibilities, especially the latter.

As Irene grew more frustrated with trying to decipher his theories, she researched on her own, finding others who were like her and Sherlock – physicists, scientists, enthusiasts fascinated by the concept of time and our place in its great flow. She poured herself into all the research of the past and the more she learned, the more dazzled she became by Sherlock's work. He was years ahead of Einstein with his theories, understanding curved space and bending time when they could barely take a picture of the moon. As she taught herself, his squiggly lines straightened before her eyes and she began to surpass him by the time she was eighteen.

His research became an invaluable cornerstone for Irene's own ideas and with university around the corner, she had no intention of dropping out as soon as her parents forced someone suitable on her. In fact, she had no intention of marrying at all. As Sherlock would say, the work was enough.

Her reminisces are interrupted by applause as the professor rolls onto the stage, his distinct digital voice echoing across the auditorium. Her fingernails dig into the armrests as his lecture begins in earnest. Intelligence is the number one qualifying trait a person must have to keep Irene's interest and Hawking has it in spades. She longs to speak with him, try to glean a little of his shine for her own, like a pilgrim to a mecca of the mind, returning home with knowledge and holy fire.

She contents herself with his talk, nodding at the bits she already knows and instantly applying the new lines of thought to her mentally cataloged research. Parts click into place, others require further understanding, but she leaves satisfied and with a fresh determination to continue what was slowly becoming her life's work.

~2010~

University was a unique experience for Irene. There were so many _people_. The sheer variety gave her pause. Her studies continued much as they had before – quiet, perfect scores. But more people offered her plenty of distractions and Irene developed her sexual reputation into something more finessed.

As she grew older, desire became a skill to be conquered, her sensuality a tool in her pocket to getting absolutely anything she wanted. She kept many interesting bedfellows and the more she learned, the greater her toolkit grew. While it started as a game to keep herself occupied, Irene grew to love the confessions that escaped through parted lips during climax, the vulnerability people kept in the bedroom (or kitchen, or parking lot, or). Sex became as fun as the work, when she had so many different ways to try it, so many different people to try it with.

After a marathon of sex, Irene was filled to the brim with excess mental energy and she poured it into her research. Breakthroughs and setbacks flowed the same; she was content to be so, continually working and moving forward. The nagging of her family to settle down droned as background noise and she relished her freedom, never letting herself get too comfortable in one spot.

Lying back and panting on one girl's bed, she noticed the high-end web cam and lamps aimed at the center of the four poster. She quirked an eyebrow and the girl was unashamed to tell Irene how she made money on the side. Being a cam girl brought her piles of cash, especially as she was able to sell whatever cheap lingerie she used afterward for an even heftier sum.

Intrigued, Irene checked out the website when she returned to her flat. It turned her stomach – these sites were designed with only men in mind, no matter the preference or safety of the model. It felt voyeuristic in the worst fashion, even if the girls were being compensated for their time. There had to be a better way and she hummed as a thought formed.

Two hours later, she had her own secure domain. A few days later, a webcam and a box of toys showed up. Within a year, the girl worked for her, as well as several other people, and she owned a successful business at the age of twenty.

Her site was classy, ethical and completely run by Irene. She reviewed new toys by hiring people of all genders to test them out on camera. A column written by her ran with weekly advice on everything from cleaning oneself to how to negotiate a scene. As soon as she did something new, she posted about it and if she thought she was a powerful person before, she had no idea what her site would do for her.

Money, positivity and attention flowed in from all corners. She was recognized on campus already, but there was a hush around her when she entered a room and it was a heady feeling. It made it harder to make friends, but Irene didn't really need friends to be successful.

She picked up a few business classes in addition to her physics and her revenue poured into her savings and her research. She hired an assistant to help her run the site so she would have more time for the expensive telescope the university kept on the grounds. Every time she looked up, it felt like an out of body experience and she would float back down to claim her next conquest to reattach herself to her physical form. Sex kept her grounded; the work kept her transcendent.

Though she knew it wouldn't be easy, the sting of her parents' rejection is felt more keenly than Irene would like. The site was popular and she knew her family was bound to find out about it, even if she never actively brought it up. Her father wanted to disown her and at twenty-two, she was cut off from her family. She didn't really need family to be successful either. Well, Sherlock was the exception.

She sometimes wondered what he would think of her methods. Tinkering with her own charts, she would imagine him in the room, helping her brainstorm (or would he think she was an idiot too?). It didn't matter what he thought – he was dead – but it comforted Irene to remember the Sherlock of her childhood, the person she would travel in the green TARDIS with to go on mad adventures.

He likely wouldn't approve of her business, but it wasn't for him.

At eighteen, the deed to her Grandmaman's house officially transferred over to her name, even if the majority of her extended family were hiring lawyers every year to contest her claim. As soon as she graduated university, she put the house on the market. Once she finalized everything, she walked away with a hefty 1.5 million pounds in her bank account. The house and area had only increased in value since her Grandmaman died and Irene took every advantage she could during the sale. She drank a glass of wine a few months ago on her twenty-second birthday and congratulated herself with a very special set of keys.

Her stilettos click on the pavement as she moves with purpose through London's crowds. She resists the urge to touch the keys stuffed in her handbag. People shoulder past her loaded down with shopping bags while music drifts from open doorways and cafe fronts. Business is booming in this area which is great for Irene.

She stops in front of a papered-over store front. Her heart thunders as she slides the key into the new lock. Stepping inside, she closes the door behind her and the sounds from the outside street fade to almost nothing. The lights don't come on when she flicks the switch, but she isn't surprised, not with the amount of work she has left to do here.

There's a counter in the back, as well as a staircase leading to the other two floors, plus a further room behind this main space. The realtor promised the hardwood floors she walks on are original to the building. She stands in the middle of the empty room, gold light filtering through the brown paper of the windows. Her coat pools around her as she sinks to the floor, really taking in what she's done.

This building belongs to her. The knowledge soaks in as she studies the exposed beams and lets her imagination take over decorating the bare walls. A knock on the door startles her, but it's only the cleaning service. She lets them in and pats her hair, running her nails along the wall as she takes the stairs to explores the upper levels.

The second floor would be her room, when the movers brought all her things tomorrow. Her desk with its piles of research would go next to the window so she could gaze outside when she needed a break. She expects shipments within the week for her business and she has a few more legal papers to sign and ship off before she can open the front doors on her shop.

An order with a sign maker went out last month and she decided to call her shop the same as her website – Mercy. She opens the window and leans on it, observing the street below with a wicked grin. This neighborhood is not going to know what hit it when Mercy opens. Her phone chirps and she allows a few more moments of satisfaction before checking her messages. She shuts the window and heads downstairs, the smile never leaving her face.


End file.
